This is one of those times I wish I could photoshop....because the headline is begging for Russell Crowe in Gladiator telling his troops to unleash hell...but instead of Roman troops, there's a line of computer geeks.

Did they hire the required number narcissistic conspiracy theorists to "break" stories that were news in 2006 and the defect to China like a spineless coward? Because if they didn't then who will internet nerds fawn over as their hero?

Cyber war:"Oh noes! They haxx0red by computer! It'll take a whole hour to wipe the drive and reload a fresh backup."

Except... for the American electrical power grid, which is controlled by an Internet accessible network for some reason...

/Parts are controlled by foreign entities.//and shared with Canada.

If you two are interested in the true SCIENCE behind hacking and want a no-frills look at the consequences of inadequate network security, pick up a copy of the educational film Live Free or Die Hard from your local library!

Ok, I know this is a stretch, but hypothetically wouldn't having this stockpile of information in the PRISM system actually make us horribly tactically vulnerable if some foreign government (China) were able to access it?

I love how they make things seems like they are super ultra high tech when honestly most hacks and intrusions happen because places do not even take the simplest of steps to secure their information.

Open ports on firewalls, failed group policies, to not updating software regularly....all these very simple things that can prevent intrusions on a most basic level yet when you approach places about implementing them they either scoff at the cost or biatch and moan that because Johnny over in engineering would be inconvenienced by them they should not do them.

Nothing in this world security is going to change until people start taking proactive steps towards securing networks, instead of reactive when the shiat hits the fan.

And honestly the same goes for intelligence gathering. More intelligence could be gathered by utilizing the NSA and CIA by infiltrating networks, cultivating people contacts and having actual agents in the field than could ever be gathered by trying to analyze and formulate algorithms based on your cat postings on facebook....but that would be a proactive step compared to the farking idiotic reactive steps we do now.

Torrent of Rubbish:If you two are interested in the true SCIENCE behind hacking and want a no-frills look at the consequences of inadequate network security, pick up a copy of the educational film Live Free or Die Hard from your local library!

vudukungfu:. To block any telltale electromagnetic signals from escaping, the inner walls of the buildings are wrapped in protective copper shielding and the one-way windows are embedded with a fine copper mesh.

vudukungfu:. To block any telltale electromagnetic signals from escaping, the inner walls of the buildings are wrapped in protective copper shielding and the one-way windows are embedded with a fine copper mesh.

And all I have is a tin foil hat.

I just wrapped my modem and router in tin foil too, after reading that...

runescorpio:vudukungfu: . To block any telltale electromagnetic signals from escaping, the inner walls of the buildings are wrapped in protective copper shielding and the one-way windows are embedded with a fine copper mesh.

runescorpio:vudukungfu: . To block any telltale electromagnetic signals from escaping, the inner walls of the buildings are wrapped in protective copper shielding and the one-way windows are embedded with a fine copper mesh.

And all I have is a tin foil hat.

Apparently you're doing it wrong. You need a copper hat.

If you did that it be stolen so someone could sell it at the scrap merchants.

In his telling, the threat is so mind-bogglingly huge that the nation has little option but to eventually put the entire civilian Internet under his protection, requiring tweets and emails to pass through his filters, and putting the kill switch under the government's forefinger. "What we see is an increasing level of activity on the networks," he said at a recent security conference in Canada. "I am concerned that this is going to break a threshold where the private sector can no longer handle it and the government is going to have to step in."

FTFA: The first known piece of malware designed to destroy physical equipment, Stuxnet was aimed at Iran's nuclear facility in Natanz. By surreptitiously taking control of an industrial control link known as a Scada (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) system, the sophisticated worm was able to damage about a thousand centrifuges used to enrich nuclear material.

Look, it's SCADA. All caps. Because it stands for something. Acronyms, how do they work? To be perfectly honest, most of our pipelines and power plants use technology older than dirt. Or at least, from the era when the interwebz first began. A good amount do their best to keep up with the times but, like anything having to do with politics and technology, everything takes time and money and a lot of old people who don't know that most folks don't use dial-up any more to approve sht.

Torrent of Rubbish:If you two are interested in the true SCIENCE behind hacking and want a no-frills look at the consequences of inadequate network security, pick up a copy of the educational film Live Free or Die Hard from your local library!

The BEST part of that entire movie was when what'shisface redirects "ALLTHENATGASES" to flow in reverse, at the flip of a switch, back IN to the power plant. So much fail in this... Would it have been so hard to call up someone who knows something about a natural gas pipeline to ask about pressures, control valves, etc?

JustHereForThePics:runescorpio: vudukungfu: . To block any telltale electromagnetic signals from escaping, the inner walls of the buildings are wrapped in protective copper shielding and the one-way windows are embedded with a fine copper mesh.

And all I have is a tin foil hat.

Apparently you're doing it wrong. You need a copper hat.

How well would chain mail work as a Faraday cage?

Actually water works way better than most metals at reflecting and scattering point to point signals. I would recommend putting your electronics under at least 3 ft. of water, preferably with ice as that helps with the scattering. Works well with human heads too.

IdBeCrazyIf:I love how they make things seems like they are super ultra high tech when honestly most hacks and intrusions happen because places do not even take the simplest of steps to secure their information.

Open ports on firewalls, failed group policies, to not updating software regularly....all these very simple things that can prevent intrusions on a most basic level yet when you approach places about implementing them they either scoff at the cost or biatch and moan that because Johnny over in engineering would be inconvenienced by them they should not do them.

Nothing in this world security is going to change until people start taking proactive steps towards securing networks, instead of reactive when the shiat hits the fan.

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While you are correct in that we must prioritize simple steps that can ensure proper security, that does not take cyberwarfare off the table. Advanced persistent threats are successful because they are long-duration, organized and objective oriented. That is where high-tech countermeasures are required because correlating activity from many different attack vectors over a long duration of time is something most companies cannot do effectively. That can lead to the loss of intellectual property, trade secrets, insider info, etc. which are great ways to wage economic warfare.

Add to that the fact that a lot of our infrastructure is on outdated gear - and that is not as easily replaceable as turning on windows updates on your laptop for flashing the firmware on a few routers.

Another example of how cyberwarfare can be waged effectively is how Russia went into Georgia. The power grid went down, communications down, and then the shelling and tanks came in. If you want to invade a country these days, you start at the cyber level. I do not think securing our country's rather old infrastructure ex post facto is as easy as you might think. The USA was able to pioneer a lot of tech related infrastructure and now that stuff is older than some of the 'younger' countries. Think about how old some of our pumping, power and transit stations are now and what kind of critical gear is probably in place that could be vulnerable to rather trivial attack..

WTF Indeed:Did they hire the required number narcissistic conspiracy theorists to "break" stories that were news in 2006 and the defect to China like a spineless coward? Because if they didn't then who will internet nerds fawn over as their hero?

45 replies and no bites yet...bummer. Keep your chin up, its not even noon yet.

FTA:Inside Fort Meade, Maryland, a top-secret city bustles. Tens of thousands of people move through more than 50 buildings-the city has its own post office, fire department, and police force. But as if designed by Kafka, it sits among a forest of trees, surrounded by electrified fences and heavily armed guards, protected by antitank barriers, monitored by sensitive motion detectors, and watched by rotating cameras.

Sounds a lot like a Chinese manga or manhua, I think the title was High School Shock. The whole city was built to observe a kid with special powers.

Cyber war:"Oh noes! They haxx0red by computer! It'll take a whole hour to wipe the drive and reload a fresh backup."

Except that it turns out to be. "Oh wait, the backup is f-ed, too... How far back does this go? Okay, we'll rebuild from scratch. Wait, what do you mean it's hacked again? *3 weeks of investigation later* How did they manage to insert the compromise code into the firmware of the hard drive?"

Or the even more scary: "Nope, doesn't look like we were affected by that, sir."

It's not like conventional war. If it's done right, you don't even know you're under attack until it's too late, and everything from the inside out is compromised six ways to Sunday.